4iP Blog

Tomorrow, at the CES Government London 2010 summit, Tom should have been revealing a new fund to tie in with the launch of the Mayor of London’s ‘London Datastore’ website. But here at 4iP we seem to have sprung a leak and tonight I’m reading the news on the Guardian’s website. Well done them for scooping us to our own announcement! The full announcement and press release will go out tomorrow but here are a few more details and some of the thinking behind this new fund.

To support greater openness in government 4iP is launching a fund that will offer up to £100,000 to two companies or individuals with an outstanding idea for a product or application that uses information available at the London Database and via data.gov.uk. The fund aims to encourage developers to come up with innovative ways of transforming this data from rows of text and numbers into accessible and useful information.

4iP has always looked for ways of holding power to account.  But raw data often doesn’t tell you anything until it has been analysed or presented in a meaningful way and most people don’t have the tools to do this.  So we’re after ideas that transform rows of numbers into accessible formats – maps that show crime in your area, a mobile app that tells you how many police patrols operate on your street or an image that can illustrate the recycling rates in your borough.

The 4iP fund will be available to UK based companies for ideas that use data or content from data.gov.uk or the London Database.  Ideas should be submitted through 4iP’s submission system and be designed to act as a catalyst for greater political transparency helping foster openness and accountability in government.  Submissions should be completed by February 28th and the successful candidates will be notified in March.

Tom will say more tomorrow and we still have a few exciting secrets up our sleeve to reveal on the day.